


sewn together by a careless craftsman

by Djem (Djemsostylist)



Category: Sen Çal Kapımı (TV)
Genre: Character Study, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-10
Updated: 2021-02-10
Packaged: 2021-03-16 02:55:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,534
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29325075
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Djemsostylist/pseuds/Djem
Summary: She is 7 years old when her mother tells her she will marry him for the first time.  She spends her life waiting.Selin, before the fall
Comments: 11
Kudos: 23





	sewn together by a careless craftsman

She is 7 years old the first time her mother tells her she will marry Serkan Bolat someday. Her mother is weaving white ribbons into her long blond hair and Selin sits very still and tries not to flinch when the brush catches a knot and pulls. She has never thought about marriage before, but she knows that it means being with someone forever, and that makes a sort of sense to her. She’s been with Serkan for as long as she can remember--why wouldn’t it be forever? 

Her mother brushes out her curls and ties the ribbons behind her ears to match the lace on her dress. Serkan says she looks very nice, later that evening when they are at the party and his mother nudges at his shoulder. She tries not to giggle at him, but then Alp sticks his tongue out at her from somewhere above Serkan’s head and she can’t quite stop the laughter that bubbles out. Her mother’s fingers pinch her shoulder, but it’s worth it when Serkan smiles back at her. 

She tells Alp about their wedding, later when he takes them out to see the horses. Serkan has skipped ahead of them and she whispers it into Alp’s ear as he swings her up in his arms. He settles her on his shoulders and she tells him that one day when she marries Serkan then he will get to be her real brother. He squeezes her ankle where it dangles over his shoulder and tells her she’ll always be his little sister, and she thinks that that is sort of right too. He lets her down when Serkan asks him to race, and she watches from her perch on the fence as they run across the garden and the sun dips low. Her mother had told her to be in before dark and to mind her shoes, but she decides to risk the scolding; she will always wait for Serkan. 

They sneak up to his room later, to lay under his bed and stare up at the sticky, glowing stars he had stuck to the underside to make constellations in the darkness. She knows her mother will probably be mad about the smudge of dust on her dress and the way her ribbons dangle limply over her shoulder, but she thinks maybe it doesn’t matter at all when she tells him what her mother said about forever and he nods. She feels his head move next to hers, and when she reaches out to grab his hand, he squeezes back. They’ve lived their entire lives together--why would anything ever change?

~

When she is 10, their teacher asks them to do a report about what they want to be when they grow up. She has honestly never thought about it before--her mother plans parties and organizes her father’s schedule and decorates their house and attends committees and her father holds meetings, and she isn’t exactly sure how to put that in words. Serkan will be an architect of course, like his father, and Kaan is going to be an architect because Serkan is going to be an architect, but she honestly doesn’t know what she wants to be. The future before her is a holding she does not understand and a boy she has been promised, and there are no words for that. 

She watches him that afternoon, from the safety of her bed. She doesn’t lay on floors anymore, but Serkan sprawls beside her on the pink carpet her mother picked and draws with the new set of pencils she’d bought him for his birthday. He’d promised to help her when he was done, and she is content to wait. She thinks maybe this is part of her future too, waiting for him. She is going to marry Serkan and run her father’s company and she isn’t exactly sure what sort of job that is. She asks Alp, later when he comes to pick Serkan up. She tells him that she wants it to sound right _and also that Serkan is packing up his art supplies and will be right down and would he please wait_ and he winks at her and tells her to think about going into PR. She’s not sure what that means, but if PR means knowing Serkan Bolat better than she knows herself, she thinks maybe it’s something she could do. She writes her report on how she will not be completing the assignment because she has at least another 7 years to decide her future and she will not be rushed thank you, and her teacher raises her eyebrows but says nothing. 

Instead, she watches Serkan give his presentation from her seat and studies the way the light turns strands of his hair blond in the sun and she decides she’d like one of each someday, a boy with blond hair and a girl with red and she does not need a job as long as she has him. She ignores Ferit when he whispers her name, and when Serkan passes her on the way back to his seat, she reaches out to grab his hand and he squeezes, once, before he moves past her. 

~

When she is 11, Alp dies, and it is the last time she sees Serkan for almost 2 years. The funeral is strange and silent and she grips his hand so tightly her fingers ache, but he does not squeeze back. She slips away from her mother to ride back in the car with him, but he stares out the window and she can’t see his eyes. His father looks straight ahead, and she doesn’t ask where his mother is. She doesn’t speak to break the silence (at 11, she has already learned that there are some words that do not need to be said) so she plays with the black ribbons her mother has tied in her hair and watches Serkan breathe. 

When the gates close behind them he is out of the car before the engine stops and his bedroom door is closed before she makes it up the stairs. She tries the handle, hesitant, and she thinks this is the first time he has ever said no to her before. She slides down the wall to sit beside the door, and she wonders if waiting for Serkan Bolat is the only thing she will ever do. Her mother comes to collect her at midnight, and she doesn’t get to say goodbye.

She writes him letters everyday for a year. Kaan tells her it’s a waste of time and that he won’t answer her anyway and Ferit offers to let her sit next to him at lunch and it does not matter. She has seen Serkan almost every day of her life for as long as she can remember and she doesn’t know quite how to function without him there. Her letters are long and rambling, details about their friends and school and the horses, and she folds them carefully and places them in cream colored envelopes and writes his name in blue ink and hands them every morning to their housekeeper before she leaves for school. He does not write her back. 

~ 

When she is 12, Kaan gets in three fights at school and his father stops answering the phone. She speaks to their headmaster on his behalf, and saves him from expulsion. She slaps him later, once, hard, and holds him when he cries. She hasn’t talked to Serkan in 12 months, 6 days and 12 hours. She wonders how much longer she can wait. 

~

When she is 13 he calls home. She spends most of her afternoons at the table in the Bolat’s dining room doing her homework or writing letters, while Aydan watches and Seyfi, Aydan’s newest assistant, brings her water and cookies. The phone rings and Aydan answers and it’s only when her eyes light up that Selin realizes who it is. 

Aydan must see the eagerness on her face because she smiles slightly and her hand is cool when she presses the phone into Selin’s hand. She retreats up the stairs and into his room at the end of the hall and crawls under his bed to stare at the stars. She presses the phone against her ear until the plastic creaks. They breathe in the silence and don’t say anything at all. 

~

When she is 14, he comes back for the first time in the summer. He is _different_ , older, taller, with paler skin and redder hair and a new best friend. Engin is all boyish charm and infectious energy, and his voice fills up all the spaces between them that lie empty. The boys lie on the grass and Engin tells stories about England and boarding school and people she doesn’t know and Kaan clenches his hands into fists and Serkan watches the sky. She sits in a chair and crosses her legs underneath her and watches his eyes flash green in the glare of the sun. She wonders how long it will be until she sees his face again. 

~ 

When she is 15 Ferit asks her if she would like to dance at a party in one of his father’s hotels and she feels nothing but pity. 

~

When she is 16, Serkan moves back home, and he brings Engin with him. They have plans and ambitions and Kaan breaks his hand on a wall and slings his arm over Ferit’s shoulder and pretends he does not care. 

She sits beside Serkan in class and brings him coffee in the morning and follows him home in the afternoons. She makes his mother smile and tells his father about their days and she thinks maybe she will not have to wait anymore. 

She kisses him for the first time two days before his birthday when they are sitting on the fence and watching the horses graze. He stills under her mouth and does not move and when she pulls back he blinks, once, and then looks up at the stars. She watches the clouds cover the moon and she wonders if her whole life will be waiting. 

~

She sleeps with him for the first time when she is 21 and they have been dating for almost 5 years. Or, at least she thinks that’s what they have been doing, but then she says “my boyfriend” one afternoon when she is talking to the redhead Engin is obsessed with and the girl looks confused. 

“You have a boyfriend?” the girl asks, and Selin has to take a second to remember her name. She and Serkan are close though, and Selin makes it _her_ business to know _his_ business and she wonders if maybe it might be a good idea to make friends. 

“Serkan,” Selin says slowly, and Pırıl doesn’t bother to hide her surprise. 

“Oh,” she says, “I thought you were...sorry, I didn’t realize.” 

She thinks about asking what Pırıl thinks they were but instead she asks her if she’d like to go for coffee the next day. 

She visits him that night in his dorm and he doesn’t send her away. After, she lays next to him and stares at the ceiling and wonders if she is done waiting. 

~ 

She is 24 the first time she asks him about their wedding. Art Life is sixth months old and Kaan won’t take her phone calls anymore. Pırıl has gone home to the house they share, but Selin stays late at the office one night and watches Serkan work at the big desk in his office upstairs. She is checking her calendar when she asks him if he would prefer winter or spring. 

“For what?” he asks, and doesn’t look up from his computer. 

“A wedding,” she says and he checks his watch. “Whatever the client wants," he replies, and stands. “I have a meeting, do you want me to call you a cab?”

~ 

She is 25 when Ferit asks her to marry him the first time. They are at a party for the holding and the sky is dark and filled with stars. She hasn’t seen Serkan since they arrived, and Kaan is drinking in the corner. She skirts the edge of the dance floor and rounds a table when she bumps into Ferit. He steadies her and smiles and she pastes on a matching one while she searches behind him for a glimpse of red hair. He stumbles through the asking and she almost misses what he says when she catches Serkan’s eye. 

“You...what?” she asks, and he reddens. 

“I was wondering if-” he starts again, and Serkan materializes next to her. 

“Ferit,” he nods, then, “I think Kaan is drunk again.” 

She doesn’t know why it matters to him anymore, but she sighs and gathers her skirts in her hand. She smiles at Ferit and murmurs their excuses and lets Serkan walk ahead of her and she forgets about it until she is home and undoing the zipper of her dress alone. 

~

She is 26 when she goes to Serkan’s house for his birthday. The sliding door to his office is unlocked and when she slips inside he glances up from his drawings. “Selin?” he asks, and for a moment he looks genuinely confused. “Did we have an appointment?” 

“No,” she tells him, “I just thought I’d come a little early.” She’s already seen his father, and the latest copy of _The Little Prince_ is safely tucked under her arm. 

“Oh,” he says, and frowns. “Call next time. I’ll pick you up at 8.” 

~

She is 29 when she gets a dossier with a list of press releases and it is the first time she enters his office without knocking. 

“You’re going to London?” she asks. 

He does not respond, and she wants to hit him. She thinks maybe she understands Kaan a little after all. 

“Were you going to tell me this?” she asks, and it’s an effort to keep her voice level. 

“You know,” he says, and gestures to the folder in her hands. “I didn’t realize I needed to tell you personally.” 

“You are leaving for _two months_ ,” she bites out. “It’s the kind of thing a girlfriend might want to know.” 

He doesn’t blink. 

“I want a ring,” she tells him, and she’s never, ever demanded anything from him before, but this, this she wants. “I want a ring and date before you leave, or I swear I won’t be here when you get back.” 

He closes the laptop with a quiet click and picks up his briefcase from beside his chair. He shrugs on his jacket and adjusts the collar and checks his watch again before he glances at her. 

“Then I wish you all the best,” he says and he kisses her cheek before he leaves. It is the only time he has kissed her first. 

~ 

She is 30 when she accepts Ferit’s proposal and plans an engagement party and send out invitations and she doesn’t think about _him_. She doesn't. She is done waiting. 

He announces his own engagement two days after he returns from London. After all, he was never the one waiting.

**Author's Note:**

> With the current plot, I have absolutely no sympathy for Selin at all. But prior to episode 18, when I thought I knew where they were going with her character, I was always interested in what their relationship had been like. Imagine growing up with everyone telling you how your life is going to be and then everything just completely falls apart and there's nothing you can do to stop it. The title comes from a quote from the Tale of Despereaux, by Kate DiCamillo: “There are those hearts, reader, that never mend again once they are broken. Or if they do mend, they heal themselves in a crooked and lopsided way, as if sewn together by a careless craftsman. Such was the fate of Chiaroscuro. His heart was broken. Picking up the spoon and placing it on his head, speaking of revenge, these things helped him to put his heart together again. But it was, alas, put together wrong.”


End file.
